"The connector and chip technologies to enable 25 Gb/s lanes over copper backplane links are essential to accomplish narrower 4 x 25 Gb/s implementations of 100 Gb/s links for Ethernet or Infiniband," said David Sideck, global market manager for high speed and power products at FCI.

FCI says its AirMax VSe connector provides users of its exisiting AirMax VS connector system with a migration path to higher data rates while preserving the pin assignment flexibility of an open pin field design. The connectors feature backwards mating-compatible interfaces to existing AirMax VS connectors with minimal changes to connector board footprints.